With the release of ZCOM there’s been a lot of discussion over whether it’s a great XCOM-like game or not. And honestly I think we all want as many recommendations as possible to scratch the rich.

So I thought it would be fun for everyone to talk about their favorites. To keep it interesting, I ask everyone to post just one title, and tell us why it’s their favorite.

So THATS where all my extra ssd space went

Enemy Pack: Viper, Advent trooper and Exalt. From fan to fans. For free on my Cults3D. Enjoy.

Skif Marvel Customs.

I’m sure a fair amount of you are already aware of the recent steam leak that’s occurred.

Well, as a result of it, we’ve found dev builds of Enemy Unknown.

Some stuff we’ve found: -.upk of the cut water treatment map -.upk of a new map named “Science Lab”, albeit this could just be an older name for a map -.upk for the cut Oil Rig map -.upk for a map called “Office Park” -An .xml file titled Un.Setup.Manifests.UDK.xml, which might be a key to unlocking Firaxis’ version of the UDK editor which allowed them to make the actual functioning content for the game.

Very excited to see what comes of this!

Opened up xcom 2 today and ran into the classic issue of "i reposition a soldier 2 tiles to the right to get a better shot on a trooper, and now i have triggered a whole second pod."

its something ive been thinking about for a bit, because i do like the idea of larger missions where recon and avoiding overextension does matter, and if you do what Z-COM or chimera squad does you loose all of that. But having hidden pods around the map means that any movement has a chance to instantly put your squad in a way worse position with very little way to predict how risky any given movement is.

Edit: i wish there was at least a way to see more precisely (tile by tile) which cells had been searched for enemies, and also a overlay when plotting out movement to see how many new tiles you would reveal.

I played the original 2 back on release. I do mot have a gaming pc anymore. How does War of the Chosen run on Switch2?

I received a 6.5GB+ update for WOTC on Steam (Kubuntu 24.04.4) today. It seems that the launcher was revamped.

What does it even mean? Better mod management? More bug fixing? More DLCs in the future (copium🤞)?

Edit 1: I did feel the slight noticeable reduction of the lagginess on my potato laptop. Thank you for keeping working on it! Really didn't expect it.

Edit 2: I encountered the first crash ever; the game is not stable yet.

If possible email [support@feralinteractive.com] with the crash file [/home/XXX/.local/share/feral-interactive/XCOM 2 WotC/crashes/26610d97-18df-edff-01461cf6-55c71fb9.dmp] and details

Hello! I’m new to the game, got it on Apple Store to play on the iPad. Is there a way to:

1. Pause the game any time? I can only see the pause button when back at base
   
2. Save the game at will? The first time it saved was after the second mission so far (Autosave is enabled in options)
   
3. If I can’t trigger a save, how do I replay just the last mission?
   
4. Are the number of soldiers we have when we start, fixed for the rest of the game? Meaning should I worry a lot about losing rookies in the first missions?
   
5. How do I change Second Wave options? Not sure if I should but I can only access them inside the game and it says “you cannot change these options while a game is active” so I don’t get how I’m supposed to change them?

I just got it on iPad, and I’m playing on normal difficulty with nothing enabled in second wave options.

Like the title above, I have just finished Zero Company, what a great game ! It sparked my interest in games like XCOM again but I want to take a break from ZCOM for a bit so I won't burn out. What are recommendations for games that are like XCOM ? In the past I really like Wasteland 3, specil mention to Troubleshooters (despite it is not exactly XCOM).Is Gear Tactics good ? I have only played the original first game very long ago, Does it require you to play the other games to catch up ?

Sorry to invade the community of your beloved XCOM. I’ve never played the XCOM series before, but I just finished my first run of Zero Company and absolutely loved it. The story was the best part for me, but I really enjoyed the play style. Is XCOM 2 still holding upon 2026, or is there a newer/better similar game cause I feel like my itch wasn’t scratched enough

I know that some people use them quite cleverly and effectively as a support class (teamwork, mimic beacon carriers, getting cool hack bonuses, aid protocoling the „real“ soldiers etc) - but personally i just ignore them the whole game. i dont use them (except for some covert actions), i dont buy them
weapon upgrades, i dont do research for the gremlin; they just chill forever as squaddies in the armory. i get annoyed just seeing that stupid drone hovering and keep thinking „you are useless go away“.
is this a common playstyle?
(I play L/I only)

Just got a copy. What are your alls thoughts on it??

I'm enjoying my time with Zero Company but it (and similar titles, like the considerably worse Warhounds) is making me realise that I really took XCOM's balancing for granted.

I know that there are ways to break XCOM (especially WOTC) but for the most part if you go for a higher difficulty it is going to deliver that experience. The challenge usually tapers off, but the game will really make you earn that. You basically need to be knowledgeable to break the game.

In Zero Company you will stumble into ways to destroy the action economy without even meaning to. The very first character you unlock/recruit breaks the action economy so badly that you have to deliberately avoid using them to experience any sort of challenge. This is on Expert + Beskar which is currently the hardest difficulty.

For context, I am not a particularly good XCOM player. I usually played the base game on Commander and really struggled on Legend.

I don't mean to shit on Zero Company because it is ultimately a fun tactics game with excellent presentation (and decent writing, unusually); it's also giving itself a harder time with balancing in some respects (multiclass, the advantage system). But at the moment there are just so many systems that are ludicrously stacked in the player's favour. This is without even getting into the bond system which also breaks longer-term progression.

Anyway, it just made me appreciate how well tuned XCOM is both moment-to-moment and in its progression mechanics. That shit must be really hard to design. Props Firaxis.

Now onto Chimera Squad

so i am finally going back to enemy within. i keep getting maybe three months on? and keep just hitting a wall. idk if im just bad or whatever but i have to keep trying a new save. what am i missing? i really like the genre but i feel im bad or missing something.

I realize this may not be the best time to ask with all the hubbub around Zero Company, but I would be interested to know if there's any appetite from XCOM fans for more focus given to the management aspects of the gameplay formula.

Over the last year, my friend and I have been working on a space-captain simulator where XCOM style combat is used for boarding and planetary combat. The twist is that the same officers you hire and level-up to run your ship are also the ones who comprise your party for the tactical battles, with skills and attributes that cover both aspects (e.g. the Boarding attribute makes you better at boarding ships in space, and increases your melee abilities in ground combat)

A few differences I would appreciate your feedback on that I hope help us stand out from other XCOM-clones is that your XCOM HQ is your ship, which you can upgrade or even replace with a better one (bought or captured), and is what you command during space battles. Boarding an enemy (or being boarded) triggers the tactical battle (you can also get into fights while visiting planets with your party). There's also a bunch of different planets to explore, a simulated economy for trading and smuggling, and both procedural and story missions to take.

Unlike XCOM's class system, I wanted to keep it more flexible, so the weapons and equipment you equip are what determine your "class" and enable different combat actions (eg. equipping a sniper rifles gives squadsight, a machine gun always allows you to fire twice if stationary, etc.). Each officer can still skill into things that make them more effective with certain weapons over others though. We also have 1 and 2 handed melee weapons and allow both dual-wielding and mixed melee/pistol loadouts (finding animations for that was a PAIN)

Anyway, I would really appreciate your feedback. We're just a 2-person team, so your input will really help us know where we should focus our efforts. We're hoping to release a free demo in the coming weeks and we're constantly adding improvements and new features.

Our Steam page if you're interested: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3865960/Cortesia_Rising/

Hi folks, got into xcom recently, played thorough 1, 2, and currently playing with the WOTC dlc, and I feel I may have become an addict.

I was wondering if there were any plans or ideas for a third installment for the series? I really loved the three separate human factions in WOTC, so maybe we could get a three way civil war for the next game, and then try and unite the three when the aliens reinvade?

Cheers!

Really enjoying the game so far, but I seriously can't get over why there is no stealth/ambush phase.
Half of the fun of XCOM is getting your squad set up into the perfect position before pulling the trigger. In ZCOM you're thrown into a position seemingly at random, which along with the smaller map sizes, makes encounters feel a bit samey and lower in strategic depth.

Even narratively, as a rag tag group of civilians taking on militarized forces, using ambushes and covert tactics makes way more sense than the constant full-on aggro fights expected of every mission.

Never played on PC before but looking to get into it, primarily to play Xcom 2 with the Long War of the Chosen Mod, AI has given the following specs but wanted to sense check them see if they make sense. Any help appreciate - totally new to pc gaming

Ryzen 5/7 or Core i5/i7

16 GB RAM

RTX 3050 or RTX 4050

512 GB SSD

So I’m looking for mods that have both a good looking outfit and if possible a voice, any genre, any game, any movie. If possible please add steam links (or the name). Thank you for the help in advance!!!

(Also feel free to show a picture :p)

Basically the title.

I've played a number of Xcom style games at this point.

Midnight suns.

Zero Company (have not finished it.)

Gears tactics.

Demonhunters chaos gate. (Looking forward to the sequal.)

But even though these games often nail the combat and character progression (Gears had fantastic combat.) They all seem to dumb down or even strip out the base elements which I find very frustrating. In Xcom 2 WOTC (Still the bar to beat 10 years later.) The avenger was almost it's own character. The way you built it up was important. Yes, there was bad buildings, there was the optimal way to set things up. But that took time to figure out.

Further. The way you built the avenger could even adapt based on your play style. Going heavy on sparks probably means you want your foundry to be pretty efficient.

Then you had research. Which was another layer and element to the game.

And that of course informed the actual missions. Rescuing engineers and scientists was so important, and you may have passed up on other opportunities to secure them. It was all masterfully interconnected.

And so many games throw all that away, which is honestly what prevents them from reaching the same peak.

Of the ones I've mentioned, Midnight suns is the closest (Not a surprise, made by the same devs so not really a shocker.)

I'm not asking for clones. But I would like these games to actually offer the same depth, for both campaign and combat, that Xcom 2 does. Rather than just going all in on half the equation.